Planting Peas in Guttering – It Works!

May 12, 2011 by

We’ve been meaning to give this technique of sowing peas in guttering a go for some time and have finally got round to it this year… and I have to say I’m impressed.  It’s pretty simple, just sow a row of pea seeds (two wide staggered) in some guttering and when the plants are a few centimeters (or an inch) high, slip the pea plants and soil out into a trench of similar depth to the guttering.

So, here’s what the guttering looked like….

And now they’re in the ground (without the guttering!)…

For ease of transfer from the guttering, don’t let the peas get too large (or their roots start to cling to the guttering) and do the transfer when the soil in the guttering isn’t too wet.  See more info here on growing peas


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Scorzonera seeds are up

May 8, 2011 by

I always like to try growing something new in the vegetable patch each year and after a slightly aborted attempt a few years ago, we’re giving Scorzonera another go.  So, despite that this looks like another photo of grass (see the lemon grass post)…it’s actually another rather exciting crop!   Scorzonera is a root vegetable prized by the french for it’s delicious taste so I’m looking forward to the first crop.  Just a quick tip…Scorzonera seed, like parsnip seed, doesn’t keep well, so start with a fresh batch each year.


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Oriental Mustard Seedlings Doing Well

March 17, 2011 by

Just a quick post to say that the oriental mustard seeds that I planted in early February in trays in the greenhouse are doing well.  Their leaves are very pretty and will add a lovely taste and look to salads.  They’re still a touch too small to start raiding (tempting though it is) but I’m hoping they’ll be ready for our first al fresco meal.  Roll on warm spring days….

Oriental Mustard Salad Seedlings Close Up

Oriental Mustard Salad Seedlings Top View


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Excellent Germination of Broad Beans

March 4, 2011 by

To redress the recent series of mini disasters, I’m pleased to be able to report that we’ve had all but one of our 70+ broad beans germinate successfully.

The seeds are ones we gathered from last year’s crop, variety – “Medes Broad Beans”.  We started them off in pots (in the greenhouse) and will be planting them out next weekend when they’re about an inch tall.  Starting them in pots is, I admit,  a little high maintenance but the germination rates are generally excellent and planting out plants rather than seeds also means that you can avoid gaps in your rows.

We’ve always done French beans (green beans) and runner beans in pots too, but this year as an experiment, we’ll be trying some in pots, some straight in the soil and some done as my dad does, pre-germinating them under damp kitchen paper and then planting them out when the rootlets are a centimetre long.  Whichever works best we’ll do from now on!


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If Rambo did vegetable gardening…

March 3, 2011 by

We’ve managed some incredible feats this year in our veg growing expedition. So far, we’ve managed to create a mini-drought for the Chilies (still no germination from 5 out of 6 so not looking good), we’ve had seeds planted too shallow so unable to get rid of their seeds, we’ve gone from drought to over watering and the associated damping off, and now I’ve just subjected a few of the poor seedlings to sub zero conditions!  A very Rambo approach to the new veg year.

The sub zero part… Yesterday, I decided to take a chance.  I know it’s rather early to be putting delicate seedlings out, even in a greenhouse, but having monitored the greenhouse temperature for the last few weeks, it’s not dipped below 4 degrees and during the day, the seedlings would get a much better temperature and sunlight than they do indoors…so, I took a calculated risk and put one of each of our seedlings out into the greenhouse (plenty in reserve).

Woke up this morning to see frost on the greenhouse roof for the first time in more than a month.  A quick check of the thermometer shows temperature dipped to minus 2 degrees.  Plants looked fine….but now, at 11:00 ish, look a little droopy..making me wonder if in the morning they’d simply been frozen stiff!

Note to self….that was a Rambo step too far….


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Aubergine Seedlings Damping Off

February 28, 2011 by

Oh dear!  A couple of our aubergine seedlings have suffered from damping off.  Their stems have become very thin at the base near the soil and the seedlings have just keeled over.  I’ve been rather too keen to water them and had forgotten that the pots don’t have any holes in the bottom to drain the excess water.  A schoolboy error for which I have been demoted to sub-gardener as punishment!Seedling with damping off Damping off is caused by a number of different  fungi which really thrive in warm wet conditions (just like in our airing cupboard where we initially had the pots).  Apparently, you can make up your own homemade anti-fungal solution.  All you need is some crushed garlic in water or, and this is much more appealing, a nice pot of chamomile tea.  Fancy being able to sit down for a cup of tea without feeling guilty, after all somebody’s got to make sure it’s just right before we feed it to our precious seedlings!


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Broad Beans Are Up!

February 26, 2011 by

As confidently predicted (after my small exploratory dig a few days ago), the broad beans have started to break through the soil. Great!

broad beans in pots have germinated

Most of the pots (photo shows our super cheap plant pots) now have those lovely fresh green shoots showing.  I just love the colour of the shoots, it really is a beautiful fresh green.  This does however now set a stopwatch going – we’ve got to prepare an area of the vegetable patch ready for them and it’s pretty boggy at The Hidden Marrow at the moment!


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Capsicum Seeds Stay Stuck On Seedlings

February 13, 2011 by

Capsicum seedling with seed stuck onWe’ve had a couple of our capsicum seeds come up with the seed still stuck on.  This prevents the first leaves coming out and subsequently the plant fails to grow (I feel guilty!).  The cause tends to be  that the seed wasn’t planted deep enough or wasn’t watered regularly enough, so the seed covering never becomes soft enough to be broken apart by the emerging leaves.  Next year, I think I’ll plant them a little deeper to prevent them breaking through the soil prior to them softening off enough.


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Radishes are amazing!

February 12, 2011 by

Just popped down to the greenhouse to check up on my radish experiment (I’ve never sown them so early) and saw that they have started to germinate -yay.  Then on closer inspection, realised how amazing the roots look so thought I’d take a piccy.  Thousands of super fine rootlets – they really are spectacular.  Would be amazing to be able to look at them if you were the size of an ant.

Radish Seeds Sprouting Close Up

Also checked the broad beans that we planted in our cheap plant pots…(ooh we got cold hands that day – the compost was freezing!)

Broad Beans in Pots

And lastly had a look at the wild rocket and found that was sprouting.  Can’t wait to taste the first fresh salad leaves of the year! Rocket is the key ingredient to some tasty pizzas I’ll be cooking later this year.  More on that…later this year.

Wild Rocket Seeds Germinated


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Tomato seedlings are up

February 8, 2011 by

Hooray, a new veg year is here!  We’ve started planting and we now have sweet pepper, aubergine, chilli and tomato seedlings.

After a few days of rain and not being able to get out into the garden, we were beginning to suffer gardening withdrawal symptoms.  So one evening last week we looked through our seed box to see what we could start planting.  There are quite a few plants which you can start off towards the end of January/start of February.  Many of the Mediterranean vegetables such as tomatoes, sweet peppers (or capsicums),  aubergine and chilli peppers, really benefit from an early start.  It gives them a longer growing season and by the time we have the nice long warm sunny days of early summer (I’m an optimist at heart)  they are in a good position to really take off and produce fruits that little bit earlier.

Tomato SeedlingWe filled one of those large plastic tubs (that you can get from most garden centres) with some compost and brought it into the kitchen. David then set about filling pots and planting seeds.  I had the very important job of writing labels.  We popped the pots into the airing cupboard (we had to have a note to remind us to water them) and within a week, we had lots of capsicum, aubergine and tomato seedlings, and one of the chillies was up too.  They now have a new home on a light windowsill where they will stay until we feel they are strong enough to be moved to the greenhouse.


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